Windows 7 / Getting Started

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How to Create a Web Link to Add a Custom Search Provider

You can publish a link on a Web page to allow users to add a custom search engine.

First, create an OpenSearch 1.1 Extensible Markup Language (XML) file that describes your search engine.

For example, the following XML file describes a search engine that can be used to search the Microsoft.com Web site.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<OpenSearchDescription xmlns="http://a9.com/-/spec/opensearch/1.1/">
    <ShortName>Microsoft.com</ShortName>
    <Description>Microsoft.com provider</Description>
    <InputEncoding>UTF-8</InputEncoding>
    <Url type="text/html"
    template="http://search.microsoft.com/results.aspx?q={searchTerms}" />
</OpenSearchDescription>

To create your own OpenSearch XML document, simply replace the template attribute in the <URL> element with the URL of your search engine, inserting {searchTerms} at the location in the URL where search terms appear.

Note For detailed information about OpenSearch documents, visit http://www.opensearch.org/home.

After you create an OpenSearch XML document, you can allow users to add it from a Web page by using a window.external.AddSearchProvider("<URL>") call within a link. When users click the link, they will be prompted to add the search engine. The following example demonstrates the required HTML. (You must replace "<URL>" with the location of your OpenSearch XML document.)

<a Href="#"
    onClick="window.external.AddSearchProvider(&quot;<URL>&quot;);">Add Search Engine
</a>